Reviews tagging 'Blood'

The City of Brass by S.A. Chakraborty

109 reviews

dreadspawn's review

adventurous mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Kidnapping, Child abuse, Child death, Classism, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Genocide, Medical content, Slavery, Blood, Murder, Trafficking, Violence, War, and Xenophobia

Minor: Rape

clarehiyama's review

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

I really enjoyed this world! Boy, are the characters FLAWED, but I loved a lot of them anyway. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, War, Torture, Blood, Body horror, and Violence

peachani's review against another edition

adventurous tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Violence, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Racism, Slavery, Body horror, Child death, Colonisation, Animal death, Death, and Murder

Minor: Alcohol, Police brutality, Pregnancy, Rape, Grief, Abandonment, Ableism, Cultural appropriation, Fire/Fire injury, Bullying, Confinement, and Racial slurs

reddeddy's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Death, Kidnapping, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, Trafficking, Blood, Classism, Colonisation, Fire/Fire injury, Hate crime, Suicidal thoughts, Murder, Body horror, Gore, Religious bigotry, Self harm, Slavery, Xenophobia, Racism, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Abandonment, and War

Moderate: Grief, Misogyny, Confinement, Cursing, Death of parent, Physical abuse, Animal death, Alcohol, Bullying, Terminal illness, Sexual content, Genocide, Animal cruelty, Dysphoria, Racial slurs, and Sexism

Minor: Pregnancy, Sexual violence, Infidelity, Child death, Outing, Homophobia, Sexual harassment, Torture, Child abuse, Biphobia, Antisemitism, Chronic illness, Police brutality, Drug use, Sexual assault, Cultural appropriation, Body shaming, Islamophobia, Infertility, Physical abuse, and Rape

butkerfingers's review

adventurous mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence and Blood

Moderate: War

Minor: Rape

mmelibertine's review

adventurous tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

I could fix him. Probably. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Violence, Blood, and War

Minor: Rape

juliana_reads's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I loved this. It does start slow, but once Dara and Nahri were on their way I was hooked. So much fantasy is just repackaged medieval Europe, so this held my attention for nearly six hundred pages. I read it on my Kobo to look up words and also had a hard copy to easily reference the map and glossary. It was worth the effort to fully understand this world. 

My only issues:

I don’t mind a romantic subplot, but the one between Dara and Nahri seemed abrupt and just based on lust. I would have liked to see it unfurl slowly. He’s also…a millennium older than her. In addition, I felt that dropping pieces of Daeva lore through both Ali and Nahri’s perspectives made it difficult to follow or figure out what was true and what was manipulation. I needed like a blurb or a “once upon a time” at the beginning.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gore, Racism, Violence, Religious bigotry, and Blood

Minor: Sexual violence and Rape

jenn_amanda's review

adventurous emotional funny tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Alcohol, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Sexual harassment, Xenophobia, Genocide, Classism, Racial slurs, Rape, Religious bigotry, Sexism, Trafficking, Violence, Kidnapping, Slavery, Torture, War, Hate crime, Murder, Racism, Blood, Child death, and Cursing

seanml's review

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

There are many conflicting words and opinions that The City of Brass brings about. The most important one though is this: promising. It's marketed as adult fantasy, and yet you'll find many instances of tropes and ideas popular in young adult literature. The person of low social class thrust into a very powerful position of luxury, the romance between a normal person and a god-like but very dangerous but VERY hot individual, a healthy dose of normal person thrust into magical world they didn't know was there a la Harry Potter. Much of the dialogue sounds very modern despite the story taking place in the 1800s and many characters being hundreds of years older than that. Moving past all that, I would still recommend this book. Chakraborty understands her world and her characters well enough to give the reader investment and interest in this world. The novel's biggest selling point is the society she creates - the conflict between a pureblood upper caste and a mixed lower caste is nothing new in literature, but Chakraborty treats the plot with precision and care. No side is made out to be a faceless villain, but there's also no preachy sense of 'both sides are equally bad' going on. There's no sense of preachiness at all: the world feels lived in and at its natural conclusion of thousands of years of buildup rather than artificially held together for the plot. The pros outweigh the cons and I hear the sequels improve in spades. 8/10.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Gaslighting, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Classism, Colonisation, Genocide, Gore, Murder, and War

Moderate: Slavery, Rape, Forced institutionalization, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Alcoholism, Police brutality, Racial slurs, and Racism

Minor: Outing and Homophobia

librarianeno's review

adventurous mysterious reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Violence, Blood, Colonisation, and Genocide